30th November 1997

There are (literally) hundreds of search engines on the 'Net, but the only one that has yielded Lockergnome more subscribers is Yahoo. If you can get listed in Yahoo, you'll get more hits. Why? Because Yahoo categorizes their sites... if a surfer finds a category and surfs all the links therein, they'll get to your page quicker than they would if they had gone to a search engine which returned thousands of uncategorized links.

While we're talking about searching, if you're looking for a phrase on the 'Net, make sure you put it in quotes when you go to perform a search: "apricot peel" would find all registered pages with those two words. This should apply to most major search engines.

If you plan on purchasing a computer this Holiday season, let me give you a couple of hints: you'll kick yourself in the pants come next fall (a whole new kind of computer will be out: Windows 98, DVD drives, a TV tuner cards, faster motherboards, etc.). If you do decide to get one soon, remember that you usually get what you pay for. A cheaper computer will have lesser quality components and will (typically) be more difficult it will be to upgrade in the future. Always talk to the computer geek in your family before you purchase anything... that kind of consulting is usually free.

More people get sick during the winter months (at least in Iowa). Keep a can of Lysol (or anti-bacterial air spray) close to the keyboard and spray it every day or so... especially if you have a lot of people using the keyboard on a regular basis (children, roomies, friends, etc.). Do you wash your hands regularly? :) I don't want you getting sick...